Girlfriend posts photos and robber gets time

Bank robber Bryan Campbell, who terrorized tellers with a laser-sight-equipped pistol in holdups in Verona and Plum, was hoping for a dozen years in prison Wednesday but got more than 15.

U.S. District Judge Cathy Bissoon gave him 181 months behind bars. His partner in the holdups, Daymon Ottey, is serving 57 months.

Ottey, of Penn Hills, planned the capers and drove the getaway car, which belonged to his girlfriend. Campbell, of Crafton, was the gunman.

The pair had pleaded guilty. Among the FBI’s extensive evidence were Facebook posts by Campbell’s girlfriend showing them on vacation in Florida, eating out and flaunting jewelry shortly after the holdup of First National Bank in Verona on May 1, 2017.

They could afford those expenses because, while Campbell didn’t have a job and earned zero income that year, he did have $84,000 he took from the bank after gaining access to the vault.

The typical bank robbery yields a few thousand dollars. But when Campbell went into First National on that day, the vault happened to be open. So he jumped the counter and ordered a teller to fill his bag with cash at gunpoint.

He split the money with Ottey, who had planned that robbery and one at S&T Bank in Plum a few months earlier.

While Campbell frolicked in Florida, Ottey used some of his newfound cash to buy a Jeep. He and Campbell used the vehicle for an attempted third robbery in Baden in July 2017, but the pair got spooked during that one and didn’t rob it.

The FBI eventually caught Ottey in Penn Hills and Campbell in Beaver Falls.

In court Wednesday, Campbell’s public defender, Thomas Livingston, said his client should get 12 years because he’s an atypical bank robber in that he’s not a drug addict and his prior record is minor. He said Campbell went from “minor to major” crimes without any escalating crimes in between, which is unusual.

“I know I made a bad decision,” Campbell told the judge.

The judge pointed out that he made more than just one bad decision, considering there were two robberies and an attempted third.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Tim Lanni said Campbell doesn’t deserve any breaks because he went into banks with a gun and threatened employees with it. He asked for 200 months.

Judge Bissoon chose a term in between and said she’ll recommend that Campbell serve it at a prison as near as possible to Fort Myers, Fla., where his parents live.